Some research suggests that the benefits from brainwave entrainment can last a lot longer, and still be seen for some time after you've stopped using it. Study participants have still maintained improved test scores a few weeks after the stimulation had ceased. Research on the long-term benefits has so far been minimal though, so how long the effects last is still up for debate.

Reading can be a wonderful (and healthy) escape from the stress of everyday life. Simply by opening a book, you allow yourself to be invited into a literary world that distracts you from your daily stressors. Reading can even relax your body by lowering your heart rate and easing the tension in your muscles. A 2009 study at the University of Sussex found that reading can reduce stress by up to 68%. It works better and faster than other relaxation methods, such as listening to music or drinking a hot cup of tea. This is because your mind is invited into a literary world that is free from the stressors that plague your daily life.

Some people deny there is any such thing as “spiritual”. Atheists, secular humanists, etc., do not as a rule accept the concept of the existence of things “spiritual.” For them the benefits of meditation are largely physical and/or emotional in nature. It is not my intention to dispute or attempt to change their views here. What I can say is that they are free to skip over any mention of things spiritual and focus on the physical/emotional aspects. Meditation is a broad enough discipline to encompass all these areas of our existence.
These brainwaves are actually a bit of a mystery. They’re the highest frequency you can achieve, but scientists are a little dumbfounded by them. Unlike the next set of brainwaves (Alpha and Beta), Gamma brainwaves don’t’ really translate to feeling active and alert. Rather, what’s been discovered is that in Gamma, neurons are firing so harmoniously, that people often feel like they are having a spiritual experience. This brainwave state has been associated with expanding consciousness and understanding the value of universal love and harmony.
Despite the vast differences between each individual, our brain’s inner workings are remarkably similar. Brainwave Entrainment was built around these fundamental similarities and has equally powerful effects for almost everyone who uses it. While each situation may require a different frequency or audio track, Brainwave Love has one of the most complete, effective libraries to cover your every need. Take a look now:

So, in summary, binaural beats certainly do not work the way the sellers claim, but there's no reason to think they're any less effective than any other music track you might listen to that effects you in a way you like. If they make you sleepy (like they all do for me), use them to go to sleep. If they relax you or get you amped, use them for that. But don't expect them to be any more effective than regular music. If someone you know claims that they are, put them to the test, and bust the myth.

This depends on how ready your brain is to absorb the impact of the tones and how responsive it is. Most people experience a feeling of relaxation and calm right from the first session. The degree to which you feel these hinges on how well your brain reacts. Use it over a few days and you can experience unmistakable signs of stress reduction and improved clarity of mind. After a while, when you brain gets trained in allowing better communication between the right and left hemispheres, you will sense that the feeling of mental clarity and calm carry forward even hours after a session.
♥ Imagine a really bad ringing in your ear and the pain that it brought along or when your ear was throbbing with pain. Can you remember the sound coming from that ear? Probably not, since the pain was probably far more memorable. This sounds very similar to that, but it is not at all painful. Quite a unique experience, really. Try it out, but you need to be wearing earphones and have the volume up.
Most of these websites give some brief explanation of entrainment. The example you hear most often is that of Dutch polymath Christiaan Huygens, who in 1665, hung two pendulum clocks next to each other on a wall. He noticed that the pendulums eventually matched each others' frequency, but always in antiphase, opposite to each other, as if canceling each other out. He'd try disturbing one or setting them in sync, but they'd always return to the same antiphase synchronization. Huygen's experience is widely touted on binaural beat websites as a demonstration of how systems can become spiritually connected through some energy field. However, they misunderstand what happened, and have not read the full story. Huygens also tried taking one clock off the wall, and as soon as they were no longer physically connected to one another via the actual wall, the effect disappeared. It was not the proximity of the clocks to one another that created the entrainment; it was their physical, mechanical connection to one another. As each pendulum swung it imparted an infinitesimal equal and opposite reaction to the wall itself. With two clocks on the wall, the system naturally sought the lowest energy level, according to the laws of thermodynamics; and both pendulums would thus swing exactly counter to each other, minimizing the system's total energy.
According to a recent study published in the British journal Heart, slow or meditative music is a proven stress buster, so set your dial to a soothing station during your commute. And, if you're stuck in a traffic jam, sneak in this quick exercise: Grab your steering wheel and clench the muscles in your fingers, arms, shoulders and back. Do this until your muscles begin to tremble (about 45 seconds), then release. You'll produce a wave of relief in your upper neck and arms all the way down to your fingers. Just make sure your foot is on the brake when you let go of the wheel! (FYI: pink noise is the newest tool for reducing stress.)
(Shannahoff-Khalsa, 1991; Webb & Dube, 1981). These naturally occurring shifts may underlie the anecdotal reports of fluctuations in the effectiveness of binaural beats. External factors are also thought to play roles in mediating the effects of binaural beats (Owens & Atwater, 1995). The perception of a binaural beat is, for example, said to be heightened by the addition of white noise to the carrier signal (Oster, 1973), so white noise is often used as background. "Music, relaxation exercises, guided imagery, and verbal suggestion have all been used to enhance the state-changing effects of the binaural beat" (Owens & Atwater, 1995). Other practices such as humming, toning, breathing exercises, autogenic training, and/or biofeedback can also be used to interrupt the homeostasis of resistant subjects (Tart, 1975).
Progressive muscle relaxation is a two-step process in which you systematically tense and relax different muscle groups in the body. With regular practice, it gives you an intimate familiarity with what tension as well as complete relaxation feels like in different parts of the body. This can help you react to the first signs of the muscular tension that accompanies stress. And as your body relaxes, so will your mind.
In 1984 medical researcher Dr. Gene W. Brockopp published a paper making several conclusions of audio and visual entrainment (AVE). Such conclusions were that hemispheric synchronization caused by AVE is related to increased intellectual functioning, practiced use of AVE overtime leads to a cumulative effect, and AVE may result in the recovery of early childhood experiences.
The functional role of neural oscillations is still not fully understood;[6] however they have been shown to correlate with emotional responses, motor control, and a number of cognitive functions including information transfer, perception, and memory.[7][8][9] Specifically, neural oscillations, in particular theta activity, are extensively linked to memory function, and coupling between theta and gamma activity is considered to be vital for memory functions, including episodic memory.[10][11][12]